Excerpt from Digging the Top Off: And Other Stories As this story, in its leading incidents, is a true one, perhaps I had better describe Joe Por ter, who is living to-day, grown to manhood, in one of our large western cities. In appearance he was a most unpromising lad. His face was very ruddy, and nearly as round as a plate. His eyes always half Shut, gave him a drowsy and peculiar look. They made him seem far away; and in speaking to him one felt as if he must shout to make him hear. His movements were so sluggish that the snail could readily claim kinship with him. Among his associates this characteristic had obtained for the boy the title of Slow Joe. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.